Words of the War
by Jillyomg
Summary: The war brought them together, but then it also ripped them apart. James Potter and Lily Evans


The war brought them together, but then it also ripped them apart.

He was first, a spoiled pureblood brat, a fog of lies kept him safe and secure. He basked in the mere fact that he was adored, and if he asked for the world, It would be handed to him. It wasn't like he knew any better, that was what he had grown up with his whole life. He was friends to those who respected him, charming to those who idolized him, and rude to those who hated him. There was one boy wrapped in the shadows with a scowl, that didn't exactly meet his eye. And James, because, he was a little boy with a clouded mind, believed the worlds problems were black and white.

Then second, he was simply, only just a little boy with a wounded pride, and an ache in his heart. He was finally noticing the harsh truths that rose around him, seeing through the fog of lies that had kept him on his toes as he grew up. Because, his people were winning the war, and that was good, right? That's all he really knew, the fog kept him shielded from the truth. But there's no hiding behind it now, he finds out what 'his people' are doing, and he knows that it isn't right, because the beautiful little red head, cries one night over dinner when she finds out her cousins have been murdered.

**Murdered.  
><strong>

That's a word he hears too often for a boy of only sixteen.

His classmates, the girls, his friends, have always idolized him. But the headlines in the paper have caused division in peoples minds, and him, the rich pureblood, is being dropped into the category.

**Pureblood.**

A name, a label, a word, a definition, full of such pride and honour, of class and riches. But now, a word that causes scowls, and haunted looks to cloud the eyes of victims.

**Victims.**

Another word. And he isn't classified as one, but then he's not exactly not a victim either. He's just a maybe, maybe not. Eyes flicker to him, and he knows he's being watched, he needs to prove himself. Prove that he is on the good side, that he doesn't care that the blood that runs rapidly through his veins, make him despicable. Not because he isn't of any worth, but because the people that are torturing the lives of millions, are his.

He's ashamed. Embarrassed. Some nights he wants to rip his own veins open and change the blood that runs there, because how can he sit here, attending classes while his people, his class, his status, are twisting the lives of innocents outside the walls.

**Innocents.**

He hears that word from her, the beautiful little red head, except she's not so little anymore, strong set to the jaw, fire blazing in her liquid green eyes, her hands clenched to fists so tight her knuckles blaze white. No one questions her motives; she's firmly on the good side.

**Good side.**

Good side. Bad side. Which is which?

He finds her on a sweltering hot day, cold lake water swallowing her feet, lapping up to her ankles, her head is leaned back to rest against the trunk of the willow tree behind her. Her eyes are closed, lashes fanning out against her flaming red cheeks. Her face is flushed with the heat, sweat shinning on her forehead and matting her hair with it, a shredded newspaper lies on the ground, half soaked in the lake.

He spots her as he walks past, he hesitates and backtracks before lowering himself down on the hot grass next to her. She doesn't open her eyes, but he knows she knows he's there. He's never talked to the red head all that much, when he was little and thought he owned the world and everything in it, he was a prat to her best friend, the boy wrapped in shadows with the scowl. Therefore she didn't seem particularly fond of him, though, besides the few exchanges, and one time when he asked her out and she flat out refused, they hadn't spoken many words between each other.

She was the beautiful red head, the one with fire in her eyes, and the drive to protect her people.

"What is it this week?" He asks, his eyes indicating to the shredded newspaper lying half in the lake, then to her, sweaty and red, looking beyond exhausted and all round fed up.

"Another muggle attack." She mutters, her voice is flat and deadpanned, a matter of fact. Because that's what it's come too, people tortured, killed, taunted, people who don't even know _why_. Just a matter of fact. "Office tower destroyed, it folded in on itself, hundreds died as they suffocated and struggled to be free."

Silence settles itself in the hot moist air, but only for a moment because her eyes open suddenly, blazing with the fire he is starting to really love. "Innocents. That's what they are. Innocents. Killed because the owner of the tower has a magical cousin, who he didn't even_ know_ was magical"

He doesn't know what to say, the word Innocents echoing and boucing off the sides of his skull. He's guilty, and ashamed, and angry, oh so angry. The fire that blazes in her eyes, curls a burst of warmth over his heart, and he's suddenly just as angry as she is. Angry that people just like him, purebloods are out destroying lives and tearing families apart.

Something changes then, him and the red head seem to be sitting on the same platform, while almost everyone he knows are wrapped up in fear, him and the girl are radiating with anger. He's angry at the blood that runs through his body, his angry at his money, his class, his heritage. But mostly he's just angry at the people destroying innocents, innocents just like the beautiful red head.

Because she's meant to be his enemy. He's meant to be above people like her, it's expected from someone of his status, but she's vibrant and beautiful and fiery, and really, how can he hate her? He can't.

**Her People. His people.**

He doesn't want their to be categories anymore. He's sick of labelling, sick of the names, and the houses, and the separation. He's sick of expectations and stereotypes, and the funny looks people shoot him when he smiles at her. Because, he hears them. Oh of course he does, it's impossible not too. Whispered between each other, or yelled across a corridor, muttered to her as they pass, or jabbed at her as an insult.

**Mudblood.**

It's disgusting, really. So disgusting it makes his stupid pureblood blood boil, and his head thump, and his stomach to flip with disgust. Such an ugly word, such an ugly meaning. There is nothing mud about her whatsoever, what a wicked word to use in concern of her. Of anyone.

She was so bursting, bursting with anger or fear, or determination. She believed with every shuddering beat of her heart that they could win this war. Stupid and reckless, she was, sometimes. They could never win this war against the Purebloods.

**Pureblood.**

Mudblood. Pureblood.

He hates everything about it, he hates that he's in the too-small collection of purebloods fighting _for_ the muggleborns, he hates that he's one of the only purebloods who are on the other side.

He hates that he is the only pureblood, in love with a muggleborn.

Because he is, her fire, her drive, and her strength tugs something in him. It may not make sense, a pureblood and a muggleborn, two sides of the war, two very different status's, one scum, one the bad guys. It may not make sense on paper, but in his heart it seems to be the only thing he's sure about these days.

They have a connection nobody can explain, it's just a glance, or a grim exchange, or a comforting smile, but every morning when the newspapers with the terrifying headings rain down on them, they're the first ones there. Eyes skimming, skipping sentences, trying to gather the gist of the terror that lies outside the walls. And then they lock eyes, and they search for something to hold on to in the other, something to keep them from falling apart.

**Headlines.**

That's another word of the war, something almost as bad as murder, or mudblood.

The headlines are trying to cover up the real horror, dancing around the edges of anguish, reporting every good thing they can find to try and distract everyone from the fear. But the extent of good things they can find are growing less and less, and soon they're going to run out.

There's about twenty-three of them, he reckons roughly. Twenty three of them who have the same fire in their eyes as the red head, twenty three of them who want to fight, who are spending every moment, itching to go out and make a difference. Driving themselves insane, with thoughts of being stuck locked up inside these walls any longer.

And then, _Twenty three_ becomes another word,

**The Order of the Phoenix,**

led by those who can't stand it any longer. He doesn't know what's worse, these things happening, or not being able to do anything about it. It feels right, launching into the battle to try and change things. The red head – Lily, her name is – and himself have fallen into a kind of comfortable steadiness.

They start to find themselves next to each other, as it seems like the warmth and pressure of her shoulder against his, seems to steady something in this spinning world. They are always standing together, when Dumbledore first announced the plan of the order, when the news of a new and rattling attack was revealed, at Graduation – when, as head boy and as head girl they had to stand up there are talk about their future.

**Future**

Another word that had been discussed even more then usual in their final year of school. The teachers have taken it to enthrust them with the pressure of future even more so then normal. Is it because of the war? Some teachers are trying to prepare them, some are shielding them, and some, almost feel sorry for them. Is it because they know deep down inside just like the rest of them, that none of them have a fucking future anymore?

It takes him a long time to realize this. And when he does, he almost wants an out.

How can he be just another face losing his life for what is starting to seem like _no reason?_

How can he throw away a future, just in the dry and desperate hope that maybe just maybe, _one more person_ fighting will change something.

He thought his future was fighting. The blazing fire and passion that burned in his veins are still there, but he feels as if they are being used for a hopeless cause.

And why give himself up to a hopeless cause when he has other options?

Lily.

The beautiful little red head.

The more the war raves around him, the more he kisses her, the more he spends hours thinking of ways to make her laugh again.

The more he wants out.

He doesn't want to die, and that's a basic guarantee in this war.

He's watched it happen slowly, his friends – Wendy Shoemaker, Charles Fitzpatrick….Marlene McKinnon.

_Gone._

People that didn't deserve to die, people that had lives and families and a future that could blossom, if only the world wasn't in ruins around them. He doesn't want to be just another name on a grave, he wants to marry, to have children and buy a house with her.

So one day, they are sitting on their kitchen counter, the remaining left over's of their friends having just departed. There are balloons and streamers everywhere, dishes that haven't been put away yet, it was their first celebration in months, their first reason to be happy.

An engagement.

Alice Prewett and Frank Longbottom.

"I'm happy for them believe me" She speaks, her voice perking his ears up, he can feel her red hair on his shoulder.

"But?" He asks, his eyes trying to find her face next to him in the dark kitchen, he can just make out the shine of her eyes.

"We're in the middle of a war" She breathes. "Any of us can die at any moment. A wedding. It isn't the right time"

"Maybe it is" He realises, because only now, as they watched the balloon's slowly deflate does he come to terms with why Alice and Frank have chosen to get married now. "Maybe we need something to remind us of _why_ we're fighting"

She's quiet for a moment, and he listens to the clicking sounds of their kitchen, and her breathing next to him, and his own heart thudding.

"You trying to hint something Potter?"

He laughs and finds her lips with his in the dark. "Marry me?"

He can see her smiling in the dim light of their dying lamp, a kind of smile he hasn't seen in what feels like a lifetime. "Well, alright"

And a tiny little fire seemed to be blazing somewhere where his heart must be. Something that feels like hope.

**Hope**

That's what he's forgotten.

You can't win a war without hope, you can't stand up to wrongdoings, if you're not passionate.

The days after days of coming home and having to stop and collect himself at the door, had drained the hope from him. Hitching a fake smile for his miserable girlfriend, the strain was unbearable.

Putting every ounce he could into fighting for justice, fighting for a way out of this mess.

But it had just been fail after fail after fail. They didn't stand a chance, and what was the point anyway? Really? Of fighting anymore, if you had forgotten what you were fighting for?

But they were spending the next three months in wedding frenzy, and maybe it was a little stupid, a little dangerous, a little _reckless_. A wedding? In the middle of a war zone? But James was finally started to see the world as it was supposed to be seen, when all was dark, all he needed to do was search for the light.

She whispers two terrifying words in his ear as they dance to their first song as Husband and Wife.

"I'm pregnant"

**Pregnant.**

That was another word that haunts him through the war, he was bringing a child into a world that had been shaken with chaos. He was bringing a _baby_ into a _war_. A baby with ten little fingers and ten little toes, little knees, little elbows, a little nose.

"Blimey he's small" Sirius Black murmurs as he clutches his best friend's little boy to his chest.

The little man _was_ small. He pears down at the little guy, and he thinks he can feel his heart snapping in two, his veins fizzing with not just fear, but something else – pride. His injured heart beats in time with his sons, small and fluttering and pulsing, as his fingers touch the little boys chest in wonder.

How can something so small change everything?

He vows then and there, as he looks down at his tiny son, with fluttering eyelids and wiggling toes, that he won't let anything – _anything_, not even something as minor as a paper cut – hurt his little boy.

This is the vow that kills him.

**Harry.**

Another word of the war. A light leading him through a tunnel that never seemed to want to end. A blazing fire of hope, of fierce passion. A little boy, who screams all night long, has brought back the fire that once blazed in his veins when he was merely seventeen. But instead of living off the rage that burned into his soul, he was now living off the drive to _protect._

He throws himself into the battle, he's living off passion and passion alone, everyday he suggests new tactics, new ideas, new plans, he's the life and soul of the good guys.

And someone with so much passion shouldn't be locked away.

**Prophesy.**

That was the second to last word of the war. And by far, the worst.

Worst then, headlines, or mudblood, or murder. Scarier then pregnant, or hope.

It was absolutely shattering.

Shattering his heart and his soul and his mind. And everything that he believed in, everything he had worked for. it shattered his vision and his hearing and his mere will to do _anything._

It was his wife who snapped him out of it, crying and shaking him, her eyes wide and filled with fear. He spent the night with his wife and son wrapped around him, keeping them as close as he possibly could.

Because he understood now, what it felt like to be heartbroken.

No heartbreak that he had supposedly suffered in the past was even close to how his heart was tearing in two _now._ It was nothing compared to the major crush he had on the beautiful little red head when he was fifteen, and how it had felt when she had shut down his offers of a date. His friends, classmates, his parents dying, now felt only like a crack in his heart, compared to the ripping agony he was suffering now.

Because _he_ was hunting his little boy. _He_ was prepared to chop down his wife, and his friends, and James himself, to get his son. How can you protect your child from the sick wizard who started the whole fucking war? How could he teach his baby to walk, to talk, when he knew any minute now, his son could be _gone_.

They spent a year locked away in their house, not allowed to leave, not allowed to even peek outside. A million charms and protections layered around them, to keep the baby safe.

And James _hated_ it.

He hated being locked up in the castle and attending classes, unable to fight against the sick actions that were corrupting the world. This was a million times worse, and a thousand times more agonising.

He couldn't do _anything_. Sirius came over often to tell them news of the war raging outside those hated walls, but it wasn't enough. Him and his beautifully passionate wife obviously couldn't help with Order anymore, so what could they do? He could only sit inside and paint his wife's toenails, and celebrate their sons 1st birthday with just the three of them.

He spent days after days after days wishing with everything he had that he could be out there. Fighting again, with the rest of them. Because if he wanted to keep his little boy safe, he wanted to be out there, fighting for his son. He wasted moments just itching to break down those walls that seemed to almost be closing in on him as the hours ticked by.

But as the months went on, James learnt something.

His _family's safety_ was way more important then _fighting._

And if this is what he had to do, to keep the three of them alive, together, and safe. Then that's what he would do. Because when it came down to it, James Potter would do _anything_ for them, really. And maybe he always knew it, but maybe he didn't. It doesn't matter. The only thing that mattered now, was the thought that he would sacrifice the moon and the stars just for the beautiful little red head, and his little boy,

And that's what he did.

The war brought them together, but then it also ripped them apart.

Because it did, sharing the terror that they felt in that castle when the war was just beginning, brought him and the girl together. His little boy was born into a raging warzone. So really, if it were not for the war, would James be standing here, a husband, a father, sacrificing himself in the hopes that it would save his most loved ones?

No of course not.

So maybe, James thought, just as he took his last breath, he had the war to thank, for just _one thing._

The last word of the war.

**Family.**

**+AUTHORS NOTE+**

**Helloo!**

**I have storys published on ?showuid=302258 but ive decided to come and share them here with you too.**

**I hope you enjoy my stories, if you do, or just have feedback/thoughts/what you'd like to see next, REVIEW AND LET ME KNOW :)**

**I love you to infinity and beyond for reading this, it means so much to me and my writing. Love you all!**

**Jillyomg/Sarah xox**


End file.
